“I’m going to be right here with you. None of them will be easy to tell, but it needs to be done. And the sooner we do it the sooner we can start our forever. Then it will be done, babe. We won’t have to hide, we won’t have to worry about them finding out . . . it’ll all be over.”
She nodded her head a few times and roughly swallowed as she looked out the window.
Pressing Barb’s number, I let the call go through my car and watched as Kamryn jumped at the first ring. For a few seconds, I didn’t think Barb was going to answer as the phone continued to ring. Just as I was about to end the call, I heard an accent that put Kamryn’s to shame come through the phone.
“Baby girl, are you all right? You never call me!”
My brow furrowed, and Kamryn started biting on one of her fingernails—something I knew she didn’t do.
“I’m fine,” she said shakily.
“What’s going on, I’m getting your—”
“Barb, I’m not alone.”
There was silence for a few seconds, and I wanted to ask why Barb said Kamryn never called her, and why the start of the call was already weird as shit.
“Is Kinlee with you?”
“No. I, uh, we’re on our way to Kinlee’s house, though,” Kamryn responded and glanced at me.
“Well, all right then. Who is ‘we’?”
Kamryn started breathing roughly, her chest moving up and down rapidly.
Squeezing her hand, I waited for her to look at me. “Kam,” I prompted her when she didn’t.
Her head whipped to the left, her eyes were wide and worried as she tried to control her breathing.
“Kamryn, honey?” Barb asked.
“You don’t have to do this,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”
Kamryn bit down on her bottom lip and squeezed my hand back. “Barb, do you remember when I told you that Kinlee kept trying to set me up with that guy Aiden?” she began, her blue eyes locked on mine. “And I was trying to explain to you why I didn’t want to be with him?”
“Yes,” Barb said cautiously.
“Do you also remember me telling you about Kinlee’s brother-in-law?”
“Kamryn, no.” Barb gasped and whispered something I couldn’t make out. “Baby girl, tell me you didn’t do anything with that married man.”
“Barb, you have to understand, I love him—”
“Kam, young lady, do you realize what you have done?”
Kamryn covered her mouth as a sob worked its way out of her chest, and though Barb couldn’t see her, she nodded her head.
“He is married. He made a vow before God, and you helped him destroy that vow! You think he will leave his wife for you? And even if he does, how do you know that he won’t go and do the same thing to you?”
Kamryn cried harder, and I grabbed the phone from the cup holder, took the call off speaker, and spoke to Barb through the phone.
“Ma’am, this is Brody Saco, and I know I’m probably the last person you want to hear from or speak to, but right now Kamryn’s too upset to respond to you, and I need you to understand something.”
“You should have never approached that young girl, do you hear me?”
“I know you can only think the worst of me right now,” I said calmly. “But you have to know I’m in love with Kamryn. I married the woman I did because she got pregnant, and before you ask, I do not have a child with her—he died almost five years ago. But she and I stopped loving each other long before we got married, and for the last five years she’s been manipulating me into thinking she was suicidal and bipolar so I would stay with her. Her parents’ attorney has been threatening me into staying with her, and recently I’ve come to find out that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with her and she’s been cheating on me with numerous men . . . including men her family used to try to get me fired.” I paused, waiting to see if Barb would yell at me some more, but when she said nothing, I continued. “I have been trapped in a marriage. I have felt like I was drowning for almost five years now, and it wasn’t until I met Kamryn that I finally knew what it felt like to be alive again.”
Kamryn reached over to grab my arm, and I looked back over at her.